1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a device for the switching and connecting of electrical contacts, in particular for solenoid valves and solenoids disposed in rows, and comprising pin contacts engaging each other.
2. Brief Description of the Background of the Invention Including Prior Art
Such connection plug devices are required for electrical, electropneumatic or electrohydraulic apparatus, where the connection plug devices are disposed in rows, such as, for example, pneumatic solenoid valves. Presently, the complete system and the electrical connection features are of importance in this technology. Thus, compact base plate systems with integrated cable connections are constructed. The cable connections are however still performed in a conventional screw connection technology. In detail, there exist the following systems, which are presently of importance:
a) The electrical conductors are inserted into a multiple round cable through a screw connection into a cable channel and the electrical conductors are individually connected there to the individual plug contacts for the solenoid valves.
b) A plug socket for a flat band cable is placed at the top side or at the front face of the cable channel. The valve stations have to be already connected by cable with the plug contacts in the interior of the valve stations. The user of the valve has to furnish only the flat band cable with a corresponding plug and has to insert the corresponding plug.
A known construction of the kind of interest in the context of the present invention is stated in the German Printed Patent Document DE-OS-3,801,675, where a contact arrangement is taught which can be plugged together at a casing face of a casing with a cooperating contact arrangement of the electrical device. In each case, a plurality of electrical plug connection contacts are correspondingly disposed at two additional casing faces. A plug connection contact is electrically connected with a plug contact of the contact arrangement and at least a further plug connection contact is connected with the corresponding, oppositely disposed plug connection contact, as well as with a further plug contact. The remaining plug connection contacts are in each case connected with plug connection contacts disposed staggered relative to corresponding, oppositely disposed plug connection contacts. Such connection plug devices can be plugged to each other in a variable number as desired and can be connected to a corresponding number of solenoid valves, wherein the first connection plug device allows automatically a defined coordination of the connectors to the individual solenoid valves.
However, the conventional construction is associated with the disadvantage that a very defined device component, such as a solenoid valve, is coordinated to each plug contact, and that it is however not possible to connect each contact with one or several desired arbitrary device components. The reason for this is based on the staggering of the plug connection contacts over the periphery. Thus, it is only possible, for example, to connect the signal line No. 2 with the device component No. 2 and to connect the signal line No. 8 to the device component No. 8 in a system which comprises eight signal lines. Thus, the possibilities of the selection of the signal conductors and their desired arbitrary coordination to certain device components is substantially limited.